


Keep Reading

by magnetic_pole



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Bookstores, Community: rs_small_gifts, Grimmauld Place, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-01-06
Packaged: 2019-03-01 07:11:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,008
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13289718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/magnetic_pole/pseuds/magnetic_pole
Summary: Sirius, young and falling in love. Snuggled against him in bed in Grimmauld Place twenty years later, Remus reads his story.





	Keep Reading

**Author's Note:**

  * For [liseuse](https://archiveofourown.org/users/liseuse/gifts).



> A small gift for my very dear Liseuse, pinch hitter and twelve-time participant over here at small gifts.

_I was nineteen when I first fell in love._

_We were just out of school and sharing a cold-water flat in London, living on a few Galleons and delight at our own independence. The war was still remote for us, our friends still happy. I'd bought a flying motorbike. Remus had just found a job in a Muggle bookshop in a tiny northern city so far from London I'd never heard of it._

"You wrote this for me?" Remus glanced up from the parchment. 

They were under the covers, icy feet intertwined, reading by candlelight. Remus' voice was barely audible over the deep quiet of Grimmauld Place after midnight.

"I did," Sirius said. "A gift for the holidays. Wasn't quite the moment to give it to you earlier, amongst all those Weasleys."

"Too racy?" Remus teased.

"Something like that," Sirius said. "Keep reading."

Remus continued reading softly.

_The whole thing began because Remus kept going missing._

_First it was the job, always taking him away. It was only about twenty hours a week, but it seemed like he was also Flooing off. He worked on weekends. He worked on weekdays. His manager always wanted another shift. We lived in the same flat, and I felt like I hardly saw him._

_It shouldn’t have mattered, because I'd just got the bike and Pete and Marlene had just opened the pub and James and Lily were setting up their new flat, all of which kept us busy. And even when he was around, which wasn't often, Remus couldn’t stop citing completely ridiculous statistics about fatalities caused by motorbike accidents, which was no fun at all._

_But I missed him when he wasn't there. So much it surprised me._

"Aw, Padfoot," Remus said. "I had no idea you were such a romantic."

"Keep reading," Sirius said.

_The books distracted him, too. They were flimsy little things, his Muggle books—nothing like the books we have, these ancient books with their leather covers, their gilt titles, their parchment pages. No, his books were paper, light-weight with soft covers, mostly. Cheaply printed, made to be thrown away. He always had one under his arm or in his bag. He'd read on the couch, at home. On the bus. While he was walking. Sometimes even when we were at the pub, having a night out together—supposedly. He was always somewhere else when he read. He'd get this soft expression on his face—lost, a bit dreamy._

"Dreamy?" Remus asked, sniggering a bit.

"Keep reading," Sirius said.

_And the more he was gone, the more I realized I missed him. I remember asking him once why he spent so much time at that Muggle bookshop, why he spent so much time reading, when our life in London during those first years was so carefree, so fun._

"I remember that," Remus said softly.

"Do you?" Sirius asked. 

"I do," Remus said. "I invited you to come to the bookshop yourself. By Floo, not motorbike."

"None of those statistics were relevant for _flying_ motorbikes, you know," Sirius said. 

Remus snorted. "That just doubled the--"

"Shhhh." Sirius put a finger to Remus' lips, silencing him. "Just keep reading."

_Clearly, I had to see for myself._

_And so one day I went to the bookshop with him. We traveled via Floo to a third-rate little wizarding pub in that far-away northern city. Then we walked along one muddy little street to another, past the cathedral, past the green grocer, and into this tiny shop that couldn't have been much larger than my evil Mum's loo._

Remus sniggered. 

_At first I was convinced this little Muggle shop must have been magical, because I'd never seen such a small space overflowing like this one. There were books on the shelves, books on the window sill, books on the counter, books on the floor. Piles balancing upon piles. There was barely room to stand. The books were two rows deep on the shelves, with more sitting sideways on top, leftovers that didn't quite fit. How were there so many books in such a small space? Why?_

_They were alphabetical by author, Remus said, showing me. Shelved by subject, with prices written in pencil on the inside cover. He handled the books as if they were alive, as if they could sense his tenderness. I watched his hands cradle a volume. He was so gentle with the books. He was gentle with_ me, _as if I were a child who might be frightened there._

_"And here's the thing," Remus said to me, eyes shining. "Muggles don't just publish books to record a bit of history or remember spells. Muggles publish books because they like to tell stories."_

"Oh, Sirius," Remus said. He kissed Sirius on the head and then mussed his hair. 

Sirius snuggled against him, sleepy. "Yeah."

_"I fell in love that day. Nineteen years old and so sheltered I'd never heard of the Muggle novel! Never read anything but Wizarding literature, such as it is, all textbooks and spell books. I'd had no idea that each of those small, cheap paperbacks contained its own universe. That each had its own original characters, all living out their lives in those pages. That some were tragedies and some were love stories and some were adventures and some were dull families dramas about families just as dysfunctional as mine. Each had its own voice. Each made you look at the world in a slightly different way. Each made you feel something you'd never quite felt before._

_I was enchanted. I pulled a book off the shelf—one you'd recommended, of course—and started to read at once._

_I don't think I ever really recovered._

_Thank you, Remus Lupin, for introducing me to my life-long love._

"You're welcome," Remus murmured into Sirius' hair. "My reader."

"Love you, too," Sirius mumbled. "Almost as much."

And with that, Remus put Sirius' gift on the bedside table, blew out the candle, pulled up the blankets and snuggled up against the wizard who was his second-best love, too.


End file.
